I got my results back from Ancestry.com DNA and despite what my cousin Van led me to believe I am not more Native American than Elizabeth Warren. I know that was a low threshold. My cousin had led me to believe that our great-grandfather on my paternal and his maternal grandfather's side of the family had some Cherokee blood.
According to the results shown below I am 64% Irish and Scots and 36% Welsh and English. Given I know that three out of four great-grandparents on my mom's side of the family were born in County Cavan, Ireland, this makes sense. Moreover, my Grandma Richardson's maiden name was Morgan which is a good Welsh name.
I really did want to have more Native American blood than Elizabeth Warren just to say I did. Oh, well. Our ancestors are our ancestors and there is nothing one can do to change that.
Supposedly Scots-Irish ancestry can mask Native American ancestry. Also the database doesn't have a lot of known Native DNA as the tribes discourage participation.
ReplyDeleteancestry dot com dna tests only show the father's side and then only a few generations back. for the mother's you need mitochondrial dna test which is much more expensive, but theoretically goes back forever.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure this is correct. It showed close connections on my mother's side of the family and the Irish roots that they pinpointed are from exactly that part of Ireland - County Cavan and nearby - from which I know my mother's grandparents emigrated.
DeleteOut of curiosity, what test did you use? I just submitted with AncestryDNA.
ReplyDeleteAncestry DNA.
DeleteThe test doesn't mean you don't have it in your background, just that you may not. It's hit out miss what gets passed on. If your close family members also lack a particular signature, that increases the odds you don't in fact, have it in your history.
ReplyDeleteInteresting, and one wonders how 'accurate' these tests really are...
ReplyDelete